So it was that the Dodgers opted not to go quietly tonight, with an eighth-inning Manny Ramirez single providing the only RBI on a night when the Dodgers sought to uphold a 2-for-18 streak with RISP. With the Dodgers making Max Scherzer looking almost compelling, Chad Billingsley had his one shaky inning in the fifth inning, allowing four runs and a home run to Brandon Allen (his second this year), and that was all she wrote. Dodgers drop to 4.5 games ahead of Colorado, who won tonight (as did the Giants, behind bloated burper Brad Penny).

Said Vin Scully in the ninth inning, tired of the motions through which the Dodgers went, "The Dodgers roll over in the ninth." When the opponent is the woeful Diamondbacks, that's a pretty pathetic trick to show; let's hope new acquisition Jon Garland can fetch us a win tomorrow so we can salvage a split against this sorry team.

***Ned Colletti, if you are reading this, I am kidding. I know he is a veteran player not on currently contributing to a team and well past his best days--your usual target demographic--but I am kidding.***

Look at his gamelog. He's been pretty terrible since early July. Of his 10 starts, only 5 have been Quality Starts (3 ER or less in 6 IP or more), and he hasn't pitched more than 6 innings in any of those starts. His K/BB in that stretch is 2.14 (ranking him 52nd, just ahead of John Danks, Zach Duke, Brad Penny and Jaime Moyer). Its not just one inning dude, he's been steadily on the decline since the All Star Break. If you look at the way he's pitched, he is in no way in the class of the elite pitchers in baseball, which is why I said what I said. He's a nice #2 or #3. In order for me to call the man an "ace", he needs to go deeper into games and cut his walks almost in 1/2.